Most out there understand that they can't win a race with Tyler Seguin or outhit Brenden Dillon. Only the foolish think they could score on Kari Lehtonen or stop Jamie Benn in a shootout.

After all, these guys are professional athletes who perform feats only a few in the world can accomplish, so there is a dividing line brought about by the physical aptitude required for such tasks.

But coaching…well, we all can do that, right?

It's part of the fun of following sports to second guess the bench boss. It's part of the intrigue to ponder line combinations on the drive to work or discuss goalie selection over a frosted mug of Hamms.

And that's all well and good, until you realize what the Stars coaches did this week.

With bodies flying in and out of the lineup and very little practice time, the Stars coaches patched leak after leak and somehow squeezed six points out of the last four games. Now, you an easily say they struggled the month before when they couldn't win two games in a row. You could also say that any experienced sportswriter _ or any guy in his mom's basement _ can pick segments of the schedule and claim they mean something special. But this one is different.

The Stars stumbled in Nashville and lost a game they really needed to win. If Dallas wants to make the playoffs, it has to beat the teams it is in direct competition with for seventh or eighth place. Nashville. Winnipeg, Phoenix. Minnesota. Those are the four-point games. As much as the new playoffs supposedly push strength in the division, the top eight teams are still expected to make it in each conference. So, Dallas has to win those game.

That's why the loss in Nashville was painful. The frittered points were disappointing, and the fact the Predators played smarter sort of served as a report card for the Stars. Yes, Dallas had long stretches of good play, but they made mistakes on special teams and couldn't recover. Nashville owned its identity. Dallas did not.

So, the coaches went to work at practice the next day. They dedicated an hour of ice time in Winnipeg to fixing the power play, and they did that. They changed the point of attack, they stressed quick puck movement, they told players to let loose with their shots.

"We have to get the puck through,'' Lindy Ruff stressed. "We get too many shots blocked. Everybody gets shots blocked, but we seem to do it more than other teams, so we have to be smarter.''

In a 6-4 win over the Jets, Dallas cashed in 2-of-5 power plays and looked great in its time with the man advantage.

But, seriously, it was the Jets. You had to do that. Plus, what took you so long? The power play has been struggling for months, so any repairs there were expected, right?

And when the Stars walked into Colorado, went 0-for-5 on the power play, and lost a 6-2 game on Monday night, you were fuming at home. You wanted lines juggled, defensemen benched, coaches fired. You wanted to either scream or give up, two viable options for the actual coaches at the time.

But as the Stars flew back from Denver for the second game of a back-to-back with the Avs, the coaches furiously worked over their computers, studying video and looking for tendencies. They swapped out lines, they studied tendencies and they came up with a different game plan.

Now, consider how they had to implement that game plan.

Because they didn't skate in the morning, any changes had to be made in group meetings or in one-on-one video sessions. They incorporated a new defenseman in Cameron Gaunce, and propped up Brenden Dillon, Jordie Benn and Kevin Connauton. They tried to find a magical combination with a group of forwards who can be both versatile and confounding.

They trusted that Dan Ellis would be ready to step in and put in a strong performance after having three games off.

And it worked.

After being outshot 48-33 in Colorado, the Stars actually outshot the Avalanche 28-27. Dallas scored again on the power play, and took a 3-2 win.

And maybe the most important part of the victory was the fact that the team played like a team again. With new pieces and no practice time, and plenty to dissect and absorb, the Stars fixed their team game.

"We spent a good bit of time talking about our play away from the puck, and I thought we did an excellent job,'' Ruff said.

It was impressive, to say the least. Yes, Colorado has been inconsistent in recent weeks, but that's still a talented team with a lot of speed and skill, and the Stars are a team missing three veteran defensemen. They can't afford to play an unstructured game right now.

They also can't afford to be hot and cold. The win over Colorado Tuesday only made up for the loss to Colorado on Monday. Facing a red hot Vancouver team (7-0-1 in their last eight games) on Tuesday was a new challenge in itself.

Dallas hadn't put two wins together in a month (a 5-5-3 stretch, so they don't lose two in a row very much), and they needed to make a statement. Again, they had to do that without the benefit of practice. Wednesday was a day off for the players (who have more of these scheduled in the new collective bargaining agreement), and any tweaks had to come via video and a morning skate.

And on Thursday, the Stars were the better team. They definitely received improved goaltending from Kari Lehtonen (who got an assist from goalie coach Mike Valley in getting out of the slump), but they also played a better team game.

The lines had chemistry, and no player skated less than 10:32. The defense relied heavily on Alex Goligoski's 25:58, but did a solid job of handling the Canucks' high-end skill. Gaunce logged 12:21 and was a plus-3. No defenseman took a penalty.

That was a huge transition from just a few nights earlier, and when you consider it came with almost no practice time against one of the hottest teams in the league, it was pretty neat to watch.

The hill remains steep for this team and its coaches. Games at San Jose and Los Angeles await before Christmas, and those could easily have you second-guessing the conductors of this orchestra. But before you do, ponder if you could have done what they just did over the past few days.

It's not that different from beating Tyler Seguin in a race or outhitting Brenden Dillon.